Council Approves $75,000 For Law Firm

City Continues Fight In Mental Health Case

October 31, 1995|By BILL DALEY; Courant Staff Writer

MIDDLETOWN — The common council agreed Monday to pay $75,000 to a Hartford law firm to continue pressing its court case against the consolidation of mental health services at Connecticut Valley Hospital.

But council members made clear their frustration at the slow movement of the case, their fear that work to effect the consolidation of three mental hospitals into one could be completed before a temporary injunction is granted, and their concern about a $29,000 bill for services rendered when only $25,000 had been allocated last spring.

John C. King, a lawyer with Updike, Kelly & Spellacy, said the city's case for an injunction was a good one. He hopes to hear today that a court hearing has been scheduled for sometime in the next few weeks.

Middletown filed suit against the state to block the consolidation in September.

The city is calling for the court to order the state to comply fully with the law requiring environmental studies on such projects before proceeding with any consolidation-related work on the hospital grounds.

An injunction is being sought to block the state from taking any action until an environmental study is complete. City officials and area residents opposed to the consolidation say that work has already begun.

Updike, Kelly & Spellacy were retained by the city to prepare a legal case to fight consolidation, which was proposed earlier in the year as a cost-saving measure by Gov. John G. Rowland.

In an Oct. 6 letter to the city, King wrote that the law firm had been active on a number of legal fronts in preparing its case. He said the $75,000 needed to further the work would be broken down as follows: $20,000 for discovery procedures, $25,000 for drafting legal documents, $10,000 for meeting with city and state officials and $20,000 for costs attendant to the temporary injunction hearing.

The legal bill, and the slow pace of work, drew heated comments from Frank X. LoSacco, a government critic who had been keeping a low profile since his loss in the Sept. 12 Republican primary.

LoSacco said he offered to file for an injunction himself in April and claimed it was only his threat to do so in September that brought the city's lawsuit into reality. He criticized the law firm's bill as inflated, saying the city's legal staff could do a lot of the work.

His remarks drew a response from GOP Councilman Francis T. Patnaude. The councilman, who in the past had tended to support LoSacco's right to speak even when disagreeing with him, objected strenously to LoSacco's characterization of the council members as clowns.

Patnaude raised some of the same questions as LoSacco: Why was the lawsuit filed in Hartford Superior Court and where did the $25,000 go.

King said the lawsuit was filed in Hartford because that is where it had to go under state statute. He referred questions about the $25,000 to a detailed bill submitted by the law firm.